


Death and the Detective

by Rosebudwhite



Series: Death and the Detective [1]
Category: Highlander: The Series, Wallander (UK TV)
Genre: Friendship, Gen, Male Friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-13
Updated: 2014-06-13
Packaged: 2018-02-04 13:27:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,622
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1780732
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rosebudwhite/pseuds/Rosebudwhite
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Two men are thrown together in a bizarre turn of events.  One is a Swedish detective who has recently been murdered.  The other is a 5000 year old man who has escaped death too many times by running away.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Death and the Detective

**Author's Note:**

> I always worry that many of my stories will have a limited readership. This one will be the most limiting of all for it not only calls for knowledge of a franchise which has not been added to in over 15 years, it also includes a character who’s total screen time, in his own series, is less than 1 hour.
> 
> Although this is listed as chapter 1, this will more likely be just a series of one shots. Obviously I have my own ideas of the type of adventures I would like these two to get into, but if anyone has any prompts or suggestions, I'm happy to see where I can lead them.
> 
> This has been a long time coming, so you have no idea how good it feels to finally be sharing this with the world, and it's all thanks to huge encouragement from some Tumblr friends.

This was not a good hangover.  Magnus felt sick to the stomach and his head was ringing like Storkyrkan’s bells.  As he tried to sit up the ringing got worse, so he stayed where he was.  It felt like a couch, leather.  It held his long frame easily so much have been one of the larger three seat ones.  It was amazing what his mind tried to deduce when he was struggling to remember his own name, or how he came to be wherever he was.

”Good afternoon Herr Detektiv.”  A voice filled the room.

Magnus managed to turn his head to the direction of the voice.  Not too far away was a hunched figure.  The stranger’s hair was dark and lay lank around his ears; a large nose that put him in mind of a bird, no, a vulture, dominated his face.

"Where…?"  Magnus’ hand sought his head to try to stave off the nausea welling.

"My apartment.  I’m afraid yours has been sealed off."  The man uncurled his body from his seated position and stretched his long limbs.  Magnus was mesmerised as this man’s body relaxed into a comfortable sprawl on the couch, he could not believe the man had taken up so little space before yet was now dominating the room.

Magnus could now not simply lie there.  Despite every protestation his body could throw at him, he hauled himself into a seated position.  “Sealed off?”

The stranger made no move to react to Magnus’ obvious physical discomfort he simply began to inspect his fingernails.  “What with the murder and everything.

"Murder?  Shit, I need to get over there, Kurt will need me."  Magnus ran his hand through his own blond curls, how had this happened?  He really did not remember even getting home last night, how could someone have been killed in his apartment?

"Slow down.  You’re not going anywhere,” the man made a calming gesture with his hands.  “I think, for once, this Kurt won’t need your help."

"Why not?"

"It was your murder."

———

The man, who had introduced himself as Adam, handed over the sword.  “It belonged to a dear friend.  They no longer have a use for it, so you might as well have it.  Respect it and it will look after you.”  Magnus marvelled at the weapon in his hand, how the light caught the blade, how it felt in his hands.

Adam half smiled as he saw the younger man’s enthusiasm for his situation grow.  He had taken the news as quite a shock at first.  Yet now having slept on the news, he thought he could see a light of freedom in his eyes, maybe he saw this as a chance to start afresh?  However, what secrets the young detective could want to escape from was beyond him.

Magnus now chanced to give the sword a couple of experimental swings; one swung a bit too close to Adam’s shoulder.

“Whoa!  Be careful,” The dark man cautiously took the sword back out of Magnus’ hand.  Turning and reaching for the scabbard he muttered to himself, “Now I know how Obi Wan felt.”  Once the weapon was safely sheathed again, he turned back to Magnus.  “Just be careful or you’ll hurt yourself or worse me.”

“I thought you said we couldn’t die.”

“Dying is different to getting hurt.  Cuts still hurt like a bugger.”

“So I just have to aim for the neck?”

“In theory.”

“This is going to be so great.”  Magnus clapped his hands together and hopped from one foot to the other.

He looked like an overenthusiastic puppy, but it was the tone of voice that snapped something inside of Adam.  Before Magnus had a chance to realise what was happening, the older man’s hand was around his neck.  “You think this is a joke?”  He flexed his fingers as he hissed into the blond man’s ear.

Magnus struggled to swallow through the pain and the fear.  The fingers were tight, and his Adam’s apple dug back into his throat.  He managed to utter a ‘no’.

“These four inches of skin and bone,” Adam flexed his fingers tighter once more to prove the point, “are all that lie between alive you, and truly dead you.  No amount of quickening can save you from that.  Understand?”

Magnus nodded.  Adam let his hand drop away and stepped back.  Magnus rubbed over the red skin and hazarded to swallow as deeply as he could.

“Good, because we begin to train tomorrow.”

——-

This time Magnus was prepared.  At the first hint of the quickening, his eyes sprung open and his hand closed over the pommel of the sword that lay under him.  He was on his feet when the laughter sounded.  From behind a tree on the other side of the clearing, his teacher stepped out.

“Good, good, you are learning.”  Adam moved slowly towards him.  Magnus did not relax his pose, he had learnt the hard way that he could never let his guard down with him, and everything was a test.  “You can drop your sword now; I’m not going to hurt you.”  He came forward empty hands outstretched and palms exposed.  This too he did not believe.

“Open your coat and then I will believe you.”

Another low chuckle escaped Adam’ lips as he obviously remembered how Magnus had reacted to yesterday’s lesson.  He opened the edge of his long overcoat and pulled forth his sword.  They were at a point where he would have to fight, Magnus knew that beating him would be impossible, he had been training for less than a fortnight, and from what he could gather, Adam had been training for longer than the Swedes had been eating gravlax.

Time to put the first lesson into practice; Magnus returned his smile, turned on his heel and ran into the trees.  As he reached the opposite treeline he heard Adam chuckle again and that sound alone told him that his teacher had not moved.  Hiding himself behind an oak, he chanced a look back at their makeshift campsite.  Adam simply stood and opened his coat once more and retrieved a rabbit carcass that hung from his back of his belt.

Adam scanned the trees in his direction and judging the lesson over, Magnus risked exposing himself.  On seeing him, Adam smiled back and called “Breakfast?”

He gathered some logs and twigs from around him before joining him back at the tents.  As Adam deftly began to prepare the meat for roasting, Magnus built a fire over last night’s ashes.

They had been camping out here in Norrland for the past two weeks.  Magnus’ murder and the subsequent disappearance of his corpse had hit the national papers.  As he turned the meat on its skewer over the fire, Adam mused that this break from the comforts of the world would do the young man good.  In years past men trained with a sword routinely, now it was a slightly more conspicuous activity.  The 21st century was not breeding immortals ready to face this daily war.  Yet he could do worse in a student than the young man in front of him, he had the urge to survive, could use a gun and a tiny part of him, though he would never admit it out loud, reminded him of himself.

On the opposite side of the fire, Magnus tested the haunch of the meat for doneness.  Concluding that it was, he ripped off the leg, blowing it to cool before biting into the lean meat.  Magnus gave an appreciative murmur as he chewed the meat; he had already begun to appreciate the smallest things in this simpler life.  Between bites, he looked over to his companion, “So, Adam…”  The older man looked up from his own meal with a quizzical look.  “What’s your real name?”

“Adam will suffice.”  His voice was quiet in reply.

“No it won’t.  If you want me to trust you, I need to know more.”

Adam scoffed, “You need to learn to trust no one, least of all me.”

Magnus raised an eyebrow.  “Another one of your maxims?”

“Nothing wrong with a few simple rules that can save your head.”

Unperturbed by the change of subject, Magnus ploughed on, “I saw your papers remember?  So are you Adam Pierson, Daniel Clifford, or Richard Adams?”

“I am all of them and none of them.”

“I’m a detective, I do this… did this for a living, I will find out the answers one way or another, so save me the bother.  Who are you?”

“Is this an answer you are prepared for?”

“I think I can cope with almost any response…  However personal aid to Hitler, or Anders Hansson, and I think I might be making use of this sword.”

“Then you are not ready for my answer.”

Magnus’ eyes narrowed but stayed silent.  It infuriated him that this man, this stranger knew everything about him, yet he knew nothing in return beyond a dodgy pseudonym.  He ate the rest of his rabbit in silence.

Adam chewed his meat slowly.  He was getting sentimental in his old age.  He did not want to admit that it had been Magnus that had kept him in Sweden these past four years, but a man in his profession was bound to end up dying eventually.  He wanted to be the one to bring this man into the world of immortals, sure, he was a good man and would not have turned hunter like others.  Yet if someone like MacLeod had found him, some of his idiosyncrasy would have been ironed out of him.

He knew he would tell Magnus everything, eventually, but today, he was not ready to know the name Methos.

 


End file.
